Speakerphones are not handsfree

Stuart Corner
Monday, 04 February 2008 07:39

IT Policy - Regulation

The South Australian Government has pledged to tighten up legislation governing the use of cellphones while driving to make it clear that a phone set to loudspeaker and sitting on the driver's lap is not acceptable. It says also that it intends to work with other states to have this change implemented Australia-wide. Attorney General, and acting road safety minister, Michael Atkinson, said: "In June 2007 the State Government acted quickly to carry out an agreed national change to mobile phone laws, which made it clear people could be prosecuted for driving while holding a mobile phone in their hand...[However] in late 2007 opinion was raised with road safety minister Carmel Zollo that the law could be interpreted as allowing people to talk on speaker while the mobile phone is resting in their lap or on their shoulder... We want to make it clear that only those using their phones with a cradle, blue-tooth or an earpiece will come under the category of 'handsfree' and won't be penalised. That was always the intention of this rule."

He said the SA Government would initiate a national process, through the Australian Transport Council, to gain agreement of other States to any change.

Last November as part of a strategy to achieve a 40 percent cut the road toll by 2010 Zollo launched a multimedia advertising campaign that highlighted the dangers of driver inattention, with the focus firmly on cellphone usage.

She claimed police records showed "an alarming increase in the number of people being fined for using a handheld mobile over the past five years." The number was 4389 in 2002/3 and rose steadily ot 6210 in 2006/7.

Zollo said: "In 2006, inattention was reported as the cause of 27 percent of fatal crashes and 42 percent of serious crashes...[but] research by the Motor Accident Commission found that around one third of people didn't identify mobile phone use as inattentive behaviour.